


black sheep

by dubberclick



Category: The Monstrumologist Series - Rick Yancey
Genre: Canonical Character Death, Depressing, Letters, Love Confessions, M/M, Older Will Henry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-19
Updated: 2021-02-19
Packaged: 2021-03-15 14:35:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29560596
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dubberclick/pseuds/dubberclick
Summary: Will, many years after famed Doctor Pellinore Warthrop was laid beneath the ground, writes a letter to his old master.
Relationships: Will Henry/Pellinore Warthrop





	black sheep

**Author's Note:**

> I HAVE NOT FINISHED THE SERIES. i am halfway through isle of blood and im stewing in my emotions. i was spoiled that will does eventually kill pellinore but i dont know how nor exactly why, so this fic is based on the little information i have. im just enamored with will's mental distress and comings that i had to write this. the poor boy has suffered, so why not add a little more.
> 
> i may ALSO turn this into a larger work. ive got ideas.

You have been dead more than fifteen years. Six thousand two hundred and sixty-five days, precisely, and I’ve burdened your memory since. You asked me to, after all- And nearing two decades after your body rotted into the very earth you were born, I am yet your dutiful apprentice. Your bastard progeny ~~whom was forced~~ not by choice.

Lily talks about you sometimes over tea. She speaks of you as a memory and I’m wracked with such jealousy that she could move on so easily. She had not lived years ~~under your care~~ by your side. To her, that’s all you would ever be. I am not so fortunate. If only my scars could be forgotten. If only I could have buried your memory along with you. If only I could tell Lily I love her without feeling like a fraud.

I cannot entirely blame you for what has happened. I had as much chance to leave as air to breathe; yet I stayed at your side through it all and to the end ~~I spared you with~~. ~~g~~ ave you. The sparing moments I allowed myself under your roof were wasted on debate. Many times I packed myself a bag tight with emptiness and told myself it was the day. I would leave you to your own ill demise. If I did not frighten myself out of it before I reached the door, happenstance would reel me back. I would see a week-dirty tea kettle, _Had he eaten at all today?_ Or I would spy a piece of your surgical instrument arsenal, _I should replace this where it belongs._ Or yourself would call my name before I could lay trembling hand upon the door. Each time, I would be drawn back by a force I barely understand.

Did I love you, then, Pellinore Warthrop? Was it love that ~~strove me to~~ chained me to your side? Back then, I could not be certain and even as the years pass; I’ve not yet the full answer. At least, not a definite one, and I’ve had two lifetime’s worth of thought to think. My father, I believe, is the strongest drive. Not to disappoint him or let his disposal to you be wasted on someone who would not continue his work. I suffered a great burden under your _care_ and I do not think you knew it. You questioned it in my presence and each time I responded with something not entirely true- and you knew it. Did you think it was love? A childish, innocent motivation? If so, you did not seem it. No, you did not seem much of anything besides self-absorbed and dedicated to a single purpose.

It was not love then, that drove me. It was fear and a stupid commitment ~~I’d made to~~ I’d forced upon myself. Now, I cannot say the same. You are dead and rotted, yet I linger here trapped under your shadow. There is no ~~duty left~~ obligation to fill and nothing left to mourn and yet I grieve each day. I am reminded of Muriel Chanler on days like these- and how she might have felt. How John Chanler might have felt, constantly pressed under your domineering thumb. He did not have a choice to be reminded of you each day he looked at his torn wife, and Muriel had no choice but to dwell in her heart’s choice. I, however? I chose. I chose to ignore myself in favor of your exploits and desires and now…

It is love, Doctor. There is no other explanation for my torment. I’ve tried grief, fury, jealousy, and the whole lot of spiteful emotion and vengeance. It could have explained my behavior back when I was young, but now I’ve learned things have changed. I think of you far too often and far too painfully for it to be anything related to spite. It is disgusting how my heart continues to grieve for a man I ~~bid to re~~ killed. Spared. Some could call it that.

Lily knows this. Sometimes I tell her and other times naught, but she’s always been keen. Actually, I believe she knew before even I dared lay the train of thought across my consciousness. She’s kind that way, in one of the only ways I know her to be, that she does not deceive herself with false pretenses of those she loves. She married me knowing there would be no ceremony or vows and that not the words, _“_ ” _I love you,_ ” would come from either of our lips. She told me it would allow her to continue her aspirations effectively and I told her she was the only person I trusted. Alive, that is. The other has always been you, and you’re dead.

I write that phrase and I think those words, _Pellinore Warthrop is dead. Has been for over a decade_ , and yet they never feel true. Because you live, don’t you? As you’ve always wished- inside my tortured mind. Then why do I grieve for a man who lives? Why does my heart ache so when I’ve still got your blasphemies in my ear? When we had brushed with death back in those hellish winter woods, do you remember the words you had said to me? I remember each scorn and insult that fell from your feverish lips and it’s been the singular most intriguing curiosity of mine why I stayed. Why I stay now, for a man whose true colors were shown very early into our years.

And I will admit it, however reluctantly, that I miss you. Sometimes I catch myself talking aloud to your imaginary presence or still hear blunt and urgent messages in my ear. Each day I grieve and I, too, have grown into bouts similar to your famed melancholic depressions. I do not regret my decision, however. I may mourn and weep, but not once have I doubted my decision to put you six under. As you said to me, and as I said to von Helrung, “Some men pray they get what they deserve, and others do not.” I believe I gave you less than you deserved. I believe what I gave you, after you had taken everything else, was a mercy. My final gift.

At least, that’s what I hope. I do not pray, but I hope that what I’ve done was worth something in the end. That perhaps you have found peace in a world that never brought you any- in trade for my own. I do admit I live a peaceful life, as much of one I could have ever hoped for, but it is not fulfilling. I’m married to someone my heart will never belong to and I wake up each morning with no goal. No motivation. You see, there is no snappish doctor to drive my hurried steps or a creature I’ve been forced to encounter. No, there is not much of anything anymore. Except for my thoughts, I suppose, and I’ve had too many of those. Stupid one, ones too late to make any difference, and ones I regret.

How do you feel, Doctor, to finally know the one you oh-so heroically took under your wing had developed such sinful attachment to you? There are nights I wondered if I were older when I had come into your possession, on the events that may have transpired. You told me once, unknowingly, that I kept you human. I wonder then, if I could have kept you alive. Would I have been able to crack the famed towering castle of Pellinore Warthrop? To keep him from racing towards the end of his own oblivion? Perhaps I could have. And perhaps I would not have this ring on my finger, or live in a house I have never called my own.

And oh, the responses that plague me. I can only imagine your disgusted horror upon hearing my admissions. Would you finally lay the hand upon my cheek that you had raised at me many times before? Would you have killed _me_ in turn? Perhaps you would find a word for my condition and cut me open to see what went wrong. Perhaps you would hold my three pound brain in your hands and say, “ _Ah! Here it is- You see this wrinkle? Near the frontal lobe, yes this one. This little malformity is the maker of your hellish desires, see?_ ” And I would hold my own brain in my hands and nod, “ _Yes sir, I see it._ ”  
I am a slave to time, Pellinore. Lily knows I will outlive her and even our children, dare we have any. I fade through these years knowing they are the only thing guaranteed. A prolonged youth and a delayed afterlife. I wait now, Pellinore, until I can see you once again in Hell. Some days I think of hurrying the process- But your memory, of all things, stays my hand. You wanted to live, didn’t you? So I shall carry your wish until it is rightfully my time.

I suppose your death was not my final gift to you, but this: my own life. It was my first to you, and my last. I truly hope it has meant something to you at all, or you had really been a devil in man’s clothing.

Yours, always,  
William James Henry


End file.
